“C’mon, Sharkie, nice even movements! It’ll run worse than a two-chit merc if you don’t speed up. And quit featherin’ that trigger, squeeeze the fucker!”

“Yeah, yeah,” I grumbled through my respirator, having to drag breath in through the filters. Why was Walker making me repaint his car anyway? He ought to like the scratches. “Thanks for supervising. Prick.”

The last I said under my breath, but Walker heard it anyway, hollering at me from the high catwalk overlooking the shop. I couldn’t see his face beneath the three-foot brim of his hat- and even then his head barely cleared the railing. “Prick? Prick? Damn straight I’m supervisin’! Bad things happen when you ain’t supervised, little miss!”

“He’s right, El,” said a doleful voice beside me. I jumped, almost dropping the paint gun. It was my dad, down on his haunches and inspecting the car’s quarter panel. He swiped at the heavy coat of vantablack I’d just laid down, careless of how it coated his palm in runny darkness. There was something pretty painted under there- why would I cover it up?

“You’re gonna end up on here before too long,” Dad continued. He extended an arm, showing me the list of names tattooed there. Above all the blurry old soot-script was a new one, sharp as if flash-scribed: Ellery Sawada, Beloved Daughter. Even as I stared the list began to crawl down my dad’s weathered skin like it was a screen, names marching down one by one to burn in the writhing hot-rod flames inked on his hands.

When mine touched them, they froze- literally froze, my dad’s whole forearm becoming a chunk of ice. It cracked with a pretty tinkle and crumbled away from his elbow. I stuck my hands out like I could do something about it, but now I held the saw instead of a paint gun and just poked him in the chest with it. Sawada just gave the stump an exasperated look, frowning at it like it was a seal kit that showed up missing the one gasket he needed.

“Well, it was bound to happen someday, El. I always knew.” The rest of him froze, too, ice spreading from where my saw touched him. He shattered, the pieces rapidly melting into water that poured beneath Walker’s car and into the drain pit.

“Dad!” I choked out, finally finding my voice, but he was gone. The filters in this fucking mask were shot. It clung to my face like it was made of spiderwebs and I could hardly breathe through it. “What the fuck, Walker, what’s happening?!”

The hat-gremlin up on the catwalk shrugged. “Beats the hell out of me. I’m just a crim, Sharkie ol’ girl. You’re the fucked-up one.”

Before I could reply there came a huge BANG and he exploded. Hot liquid splattered my face and clothes, but it was stale coffee rather than blood. He’d shattered to dust like a dropped mug, leaving his huge hat to slowly float down like a dropped sheet of paper.

“Good riddance,” came an uptown drawl. I whirled round yet again to see Ilyes standing there, face still bloody. One hand rested on her hip, but in place of her other forearm was a smoking railgun, a miniature of the one her Praetor mounted. She smiled as she aimed it right at my face. “You kill my men, you break my Praetor, you break my nose, and now you drag me into your imbecilic, plebeian, sordid little D-block dreams. Kindly do the world a favor and go to hell, Sharkie.”

The muzzle flashed, the report popped my eardrums, the slug punched into my chest so hard I felt myself tearing to pieces-

-and I jerked awake, gasping in huge breaths. Or trying to, at least. There was something on my face keeping me from getting enough air. I reached up to tear it away, only for a hand to catch mine.

“Wait, Sharkie! Leave the mask on! You’re okay, you’re safe. Breathe slow, now, here…” It was Dezi, now letting go of my hand. I realized I was on my back, laid out on Walker’s floor with her kneeling beside me. And, apparently, breathing for me. The thing on my face was a clear oxygen mask, and looking sideways I saw one of those flexible air pumps from a medical holo show in her hands. As she squeezed it the wrenching pressure in my chest eased, and I was able to draw in a slow, shaky, but nearly full breath.

“There you go,” Dezi encouraged. “Keep that up, Sharkie! The sooner you can take that mask off, the sooner I can slap you for walking around on two collapsed lungs without saying anything.”

“Didn’t…know…” I wheezed. A lot of things made sense now. I remembered feeling that ripping pain in my lungs when the sarevna’s railgun went off next to me, but I’d had more important things to worry about. Like getting a kingsdamn steak, apparently.

Dezi made a dissatisfied noise, though she kept getting me air. “I’m not mad because I think you’re lying, I’m disappointed because I believe you.”

“Sure…Dad…” It was barely above a whisper, but I thought the grin made up for it.

“Shut up and breathe,” she snapped, trying not to laugh.

“Not collapsed lungs,” came another familiar voice. “Bilateral pulmonary edema resulting from blast trauma. That’s juice on the inside of the lungs, ‘cause you stood next to a bomb. You really are kinda stupid, aren’t you, Sharkie?”

“Thanks for the help…Doc,” I croaked. I craned my neck and found Doc Laggard in one of Walker’s chairs, busy scrolling on his slab. Rather than his usual lab coat, he wore an iridescent sleeveless hoodie, paint-splattered shorts that came down to mid-calf, and a pair of huge boots studded with brass rivets. He was even more artfully coiffed than usual, and I had the feeling he’d been on the way to a club or something when Walker called him. “Sorry to…keep you from your…”

He barely glanced down at me, waving a dismissive hand. “No worries. The place is for posers anyway. I was on my bike when Clyde called, but I had the right stuff in my first aid kit and he said he’d pay field rate, so…and besides, keeping you just fixed up enough to get hurt again is what we in the medical field call ‘job security.’”

He gave Dezi and I a winning, pearly-white smile, which bounced right off of her and made me suppress a painful laugh.

“Either way…thanks…what did you…do?”

Lag set his slab down, leaning forward in the chair. He kept his hands in his hoodie pocket, making him look weirdly folded up. “You were only out a few minutes, and you were at least sort of breathing the whole time, Walker said. I’d say there might be brain damage, but how would we tell- okay, okay! Don’t look at me like that! Got you on positive pressure oxygen, first of all, though- though your friend’s doing most of the work, there.” I think he almost said ‘my lovely assistant’ before thinking better of it. He was plenty smart, however he acted.

“Then, I shot you up with a cocktail of steroids and nano to help the swelling and inflammation. That’s why your leg probably hurts.” The outside of my thigh did ache more than before, now that I thought about it. “The stuff works fast, so you ought to be able to breathe on your own pretty soon. Breathe, not fight or shoot or swallow more grenades. It’ll wear off in twelve hours or so, so I’ll give you a few more injectors to get you through the worst of it. Walker’s treat, of course- it’s most of my stash! Oh- and it might give you weird dreams. Stay off the psilosynth and jimsonweed tea, guaranteed bad trip.”

Now he tells me. I nodded as best I could from the floor. “Good…thanks…Where-?”

“Mr. Walker got a call. An important one, I think,” Dezi added quickly. “He killed it three times but they kept calling back.”

“Great.” I had more than an inkling of what that was about. “Anything else…need to do? Doc?”

Laggard stood, swinging his arms, obviously eager to get going. “Well, there’s nothing else I can do for you right here, right now. I mean, I’ll operate if you want me to, but I don’t know what the fuck I’d do once I opened you up-“ I shook my head quickly, not sure if I was keeping down a cough or a laugh. Impossible to tell how serious he was.

“Right. Good. Honestly, at the risk of sounding cliche? I prescribe rest and fluids, Sharkie. Lots of both. Seriously.” He eyed me, his bionic irises wine-red today. “The more fluids you eliminate, the faster they’ll come out of your lungs, too. Have a good one!”

“Have fun…with posers,” I tried to say as he strode confidently out of the room and down the stairs. “Had to be…fucking with me. Can’t pee it…out of lungs?” It turned into a question even as I said it. Lag was tough to read- just another fun part of his particular bedside manner.This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

“I don’t know…” Dezi muttered. She looked it up on her slab one handed, glancing up every half-second or so to make sure I hadn’t died. “Huh. Wow,” she said after a bit. “I don’t think he was messing with you.”

“Fluids it is…do twelve ounce curls…count as not resting?”

Dezi shook her head, smiling. “I’m sure he’d tell you not to drink, Sharkie. Or a normal doctor would, at least. I’ve met lots of…interesting people since I got this job, that’s for sure.”

“Better or worse…than Nino’s?”

“How do you mean? The people here are weirder, but they’re a lot less likely to put a knife in my face and ask for my chits. I’d call it an improvement- mercs who keep standing in front of bullets notwithstanding. Now relax and try to get some air.”

I obeyed, laying back and matching my inhales to her slow squeezes of the breath pump. I wondered if she’d done it before. After a few more minutes, I was able to get markedly more air. Those drugs Lag gave me did work fast.

“Alright, Dezi. Let me try on my own.”

“Mm-hm. Stay on the oxygen, though.” She let go of the pump and I took a careful breath. It wasn’t great- felt kind of like the morning after my first and final visit to a hookah bar- but I didn’t think I’d pass out again.

“Good?” Dezi asked.

I nodded and gingerly sat up. “Think so. Thanks for being my lungs, Dezi.”

“What are friends for?” She grinned behind her glasses. “I’m just glad you’re okay!”

“Same. We need to talk soon, though- wait, not like something serious!” I tried to reassure her as her eyes widened. “About more ancient history shit.”

“Ohhh. Say that first, next time!”

“Yeah, sorry. I guess Arc ought to be there, too. You’ll love to hear what she’s got to say on the subject.” She raised an eyebrow. “Seriously. And I promise she’s changed bulbs, Dezi. She saved my ass down there. Multiple times.”

She held the expression a moment longer before dropping it with a sigh. “Okay, Sharkie. Secondhand first impressions are hard to overwrite, but I’ll try.”

“That’s all I can ask.”

“Why, why did she decide to introduce herself by slicing you up out of the black, though?”

I snorted. “I’m not sure she knows. Her thought process seems kinda…”

“Crazy?”

“Unorthodox,” I finished. “She’s nicer than she seems, though. Mostly.”

“Mostly,” she echoed archly. “At least that Alvar seems nice.”

“He’s too good for this shitshow I dragged him into. I want to help him make the best of it. In fact- you and your brother game, right?”

“Mm-hm. Him more than me, and mostly racing sims, but yeah.”

“Alvar used to stream- shooters, I think. Maybe he could get some info on the scene here from your brother? If that’s not too weird?”

“…No, I think that would be fine. Just let me know.” She gave me a firm nod, like the appointment was already set.

“Thanks, Dezi. I’m glad you’re around.”

She got this close to hugging me before stopping herself for fear of my lungs. Instead she just held her arms a few inches away. “Imagine the hug, okay, Sharkie?”

“I am, I am!”

“Not enough! Let me see some effort!” I scrunched my eyes shut and imagined as hard as I could until she was satisfied. “Perfect! There you go. Now, can I-“

A knock on the door interrupted her. “Y’all okay in there? Mind if I come in?”

It was Walker. Dezi glanced at me and I nodded my okay. “Sure, Mr. Walker. You’re good.”

He pushed through and gave me an appraising look. “I seen Lag leavin’. You feeling better, now?”

“Yeah. Enough that I’m awake.”

“Good. Good.” He scratched the back of his neck- had he gotten it from me, or me from him? “Miss Dezi, you mind, ah, givin’ us a few minutes?”

She blinked and quickly stood. “Oh, sure, Mr. Walker. You sure you’re okay on your own, Sharkie? Breathing, I mean.”

I nodded, dragging in another breath of oxygen. “Yep. Good.”

“Good,” echoed Dezi. “I’m glad you’re safe.” She left and shut the door behind her.

Walker crossed to his desk and flopped into his chair with a sigh. He rubbed his forehead, speaking with his eyes closed. “I’m glad you’re still aboveground, too, Sharkie. But I’m guessin’ you know what that call was about?”

My sigh was more of a hiss, passing through the mask’s valve. “Yeah. Think so.”

“We’ll get to it. For now…before your little nap, I think you an’ your posse just caught the chief chalkhead?”

Being careful not to tug on my O2 hose, I levered myself into a chair. Much better than Walker’s floor. “Yeah. Hesypha. Told us about Ironstride’s fingerbone, and this field it makes. Said it sort of slows things down and makes them…decay, I guess, all at once. She didn’t seem to get it much more than we do.”

“Right. Figures they’d mess with that kinda shit first and figure it out later. It’s only one of the dead fuckin’ Kings.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I got no clue what that’s got to do with how the Winnower got done, but sure. Fine.”

“I’m in the dark too, Walker. We didn’t get to talk much. That samurai showed back up. In her Praetor, this time.”

He snorted. “Heh. Wouldn’t have been surprised if she really did, considerin’ how the rest of your day went. Did the rest of the Kings show up to kick the shit out of her, then?”

I rubbed my forehead. Just watching him was giving me a headache. “I’m not joking, Walker. She rocked up in a mech suit. Twelve feet tall, Cromwell shield on the shoulder, a railgun and a gatling twenty-seven mil.”

He didn’t move, but his eyes opened and met mine. “You’re serious. Except you can’t be, ‘cause you’d be dead if you tussled with a Praetor jockey.” He honestly sounded hopeful that I was fucking with him.

Too bad. “Dead fucking serious. Do I look like I’m in a jokey mood, man?”

He watched me another second, two, three. Then he threw himself back in his chair with an explosive motion, eyes turned to the ceiling in supplication. “Kings’ sake, woman, your hazard bonus is gonna give Silas a heart attack! How the hell ain’t you a red smear?”

Hearing ‘bonus’ gave me some energy back. “Well, it took some help from Arc. She can, hmm…make it harder to get hit, I guess? We hid behind a reactor, but the first shot from that railgun pasted the scientist anyway, went right through.”

“No such thing as ‘cover’ with a railgun. What then?”

I told him how between Alvar, Arc, and the PIN, I’d managed to disarm the Praetor. “And then, after hearing what Hesypha said, and thinking about what happened with my power armor when I fought the Winnower-“

“The fuel,” said Walker, suddenly thoughtful.

“Yeah. I took a chance and it paid off. Touched the Praetor and went for my…” I waved a hand vaguely in the air, “…whatever. Didn’t work at first, but then I sort of drew on Stride’s finger and just shut her down.”

“Just shut her down. Like that.”

Well, I’d had more crazy visions, though not as vivid as before. I wanted to hash through all that with Dezi before I talked to anyone else about it. Still had to get her and my dad and Northmarch in the same room, too. And tell Pengyi I was okay, of course, though he wouldn’t have known I was in trouble in the first place…Having friends is a lot of work, I thought, not unhappily. One thing at a time, though.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t over. She came out of the thing swinging.” I did get a laugh out of Walker when I told him how of all people it was a manicured blindie who managed to lay me out. Maybe he wasn’t going to take me out back and make me start digging an extra-large grave when we were done. He wasn’t as happy when he found out that Ilyes escaped.

“So you’re tellin’ me.” His hand went into his jacket for a burner but came up empty. It had to settle for gripping the edge of his desk. “That you an’ your buddies wrecked a samurai’s operation. Wrecked her Praetor. Beat the shit out of her. An’ then let her get away?”

“We didn’t let her do shit, Walker,” I snapped. “We were all kinds of fucked up and she was tough. Blindie or not, she would’ve folded you up like a- like…” Fucking sleep deprivation. And/or concussion.

“Take-out box?” Walker offered tiredly. “Yeah. That was uncalled for, Sharkie. I wasn’t there, and I don’t get to be your Monday-morning codriver. How’d you get out of there afterward?”

I decided to let it go. I was tired, and seemed like he was too. “Well, we didn’t have a code to their supply elevator. Only Alvar’s CO did. So he turned that holed reactor into a dirty bomb so we could negotiate-“

“Hot damn! He’s hired!” cackled Walker.

“You leave him alone,” I muttered. “By then somebody else was strafing the place with VTOLs- some other Admin crew, almost had to be. We strongarmed Alvar’s boss and a few other runners into giving us a ride out of the chasm. Then we, uh, settled our grievances, got to the top, and got the fuck back to civilization.”

Walker gave a humorless chuckle. “Yeah, for some fuckin’ definition. It’s like I said, Sharkie- you got it bad today. Real bad. If it was anyone else I wouldn’t believe ‘em.”

“My eye probably recorded it- no, fuck, I turned that off the second I got it.” Maybe big-chit corpo bodyguards secretly recorded everyone they met, but I had no interest.

“Good,” Walker said seriously. “First of all, I believe you. We’ll get you some arm bones done before too long- it’s early, but I’d say a Praetor’s worth it. Even a third of one.” I worked my fingers, imagining the skeletal outlines going farther and farther up. “Second of all, don’t ever get recorded doin’ the shit you do. What you got from the Winnower, your other…shit, whatever it is, even just scrappin’ with a samurai at all- you don’t want any record of that. You get caught by someone who cares, you’ll be beggin’ for a half-size iso cell.”

“Sounds about right, yeah.”

“Yeah.” For several seconds there was silence, except for the faint hiss of my mask and Walker’s fingers drumming against the desk. They tapped across his slab, one by one. “Now, that call I just got. You want to deal with this now or not?”

“Fuck,” I sighed. “Let’s get it over with.”